


Light of my Life

by Sylvalum



Series: livin' is easy [2]
Category: Xenoblade Chronicles 2 (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/F, F/M, Humor, Night Rowing, Really Competitive Party Games, Vacation, Zeke and Pandoria strike again, barbeque, not actually a sequel but kind of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-14
Updated: 2019-07-14
Packaged: 2020-06-28 10:14:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,680
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19810192
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sylvalum/pseuds/Sylvalum
Summary: Mòrag kills the engine and looks at Brighid. Behind her massive sunglasses, she appears to be looking at the villa contemplatively.“Well?” Mòrag asks after she finally can’t take the suspense anymore.“It’s… rather big.” Brighid hums. “Looks nice."





	Light of my Life

**Author's Note:**

> i had soooo much fun writing this, anyway  
>  **ROLL CALL:**  
>  Lora, Haze, Jin, Mikhail - ye country-dwelling folk  
> Old Man Addam - lives in the countryside with his lovely wife  
> Rex - Addam’s grandson

After driving along nearly thirty minutes of driveway, Mòrag finally reaches the Ardanach Estate and parks in the front yard next to Hugo’s truck. Apart from the beat up truck, Mòrag has been enlightened by a neighbour as to how _posh_ her family’s summer residence really looks like, and while Mòrag has never really noticed this before, having Brighid in the car next to her now really makes her sweat.

The villa is two storeys tall, has two wings and an attached garage, eight bedrooms and a sunroom in the back. “Normal people don’t have a _sunroom_ in their summer villa!” that very same neighbour had informed Mòrag of with near aggression. “Normal people barely _have_ summer residences in the first place!”

Mòrag kills the engine and looks at Brighid. Behind her massive sunglasses, she appears to be looking at the villa contemplatively.

“Well?” Mòrag asks after she finally can’t take the suspense anymore.

“It’s… rather big.” Brighid hums. “Is there a pool?”

Mòrag exhales. “I’m afraid not, but lake Sarleigh is right next to the backyard.”

“Ooh, sounds nice.” 

Brighid smiles at her and Mòrag fights off a blush. 

Hugo then comes out of the house just as they’re unloading the car trunk and offers to help. He’s the older one of Mòrag’s two cousins and lives out here almost all year round, while Mòrag much prefers the city. Mòrag is also a head taller than him, and between her and Brighid there’s more than enough hands to carry their bags already.

“I’m afraid your assistance won’t be necessary,” Mòrag says, “but thank you nevertheless.”

“Alright then,” Hugo agrees. His Ardainian accent is even thicker than Mòrag’s. He turns to Brighid and asks, “You must be Brighid, no?”

“That’s me,” Brighid replies. “Hello.”

“I’m Hugo Ardanach,” Hugo says, apparently deciding to plow forward with his small talk and rope Brighid into it too, while Mòrag wrestles with their bags. “It’s nice to finally meet you.”

Brighid asks, amusement clear in her voice, “‘Finally’?”

“Mòrag told me about you.”

“Oh?” Brighid says.

Mòrag looks over her shoulder to give Hugo a very rather meaningful glance, hefting two trunks and a designer handbag in her arms.

Hugo notices that very rather meaningful glance and only says vaguely, “A few times, yes.”

“Shall we go inside?” Mòrag suggests. “I can show you our room, Brighid.”

“Lead the way.”

* * *

Brighid takes well to the Ardanach Estate, regarding everything with faint amusement from behind her shades and lounging majestically by the lake for half the day. When evening comes Hugo digs out some food from the cavernous pantry, the three of them eat together, and then Hugo goes outside to commit some arcane sorcery involving the tractor while Mòrag and Brighid sensibly withdraw to their shared room.

They then sprawl on the king size bed, critiquing movies they watch from Mòrag’s laptop until neither of them can take it anymore, at which point the laptop is banished, they use the ensuite bathroom, and then Mòrag and Brighid lie down and start spooning.

-so when Mòrag wakes, it is with her face in a cloud of blue hair.

She sneezes twice before managing to extricate herself, wonders if perhaps this was what woke her in the first place, and then decides to go and get herself a fresh and juicy glass of water.

She gently stands up, pads across the room, and halts.

She looks out through the window.

It’s night. If she were younger Mòrag knows she’d be hearing a bunch of crickets screeching out there, but as is, it is eerily quiet. It should absolutely be nearly dark too, but no.

There are some sort of lights out on the lake.

It can’t be Hugo, simply because what… would he be doing in the lake at two am?

What… would anyone be doing in lake Sarleigh at two am?

Grimly, Mòrag must face the reality that: anyone out in the lake at two fucking am is either 1) very dimwitted, or 2) up to no good. Perhaps both. Probably both.

Mòrag is just deciding to go out and investigate it and therefore leave a note for Brighid, turning back around, only to see that Brighid is already awake. 

“Mòrag?” she asks, only she yawns right in the middle of the word.

“Something is going on in the lake,” Mòrag says gravely. “I shall go outside and investigate.”

“Sounds fun,” Brighid says. “I’ll come with you.”

They both shrug on jackets, for mosquito protection, and put on knee high waterproof boots, of which there are no shortage of in the foyer. Every time Mòrag returns here, the boot collection has somehow spawned another pair of neon coloured duck-adorned galoshes.

Appropriately armoured, they go outside and trek around the house.

At night, lake Sarleigh is just a vague blur of softly rippling darkness. The air is humid and cool and silent, apart from the very, very conspicuous sploshing noises originating from the lake, that suspiciously die down as soon as Mòrag and Brighid get close enough to the lake.

The eerie lights from before have also disappeared.

For a moment everything seems to stand still.

Then there’s a buzzing noise, and Mòrag’s hand darts out and crushes a mosquito between her thumb and index finger, just inches away from her cheek. 

“Right,” she says, the night feeling significantly less peaceful now that they’ve revealed their position to the mosquitoes. “We don’t have time for this.”

“What happens now?” Brighid sounds like she very much finds more humour in this situation than Mòrag.

Mòrag clears her throat. She raises her voice and says, loudly, in the general direction of the lake vandals’ last known location, “This is private property. I’m asking you to leave.”

There’s some noise, and then a guy with a weird accent yells back, “You don’t own the whole lake!”

Perhaps not, but most of it _does_ belong to the Ardanachs. They have official documents that say so, in fact. “You are on our side of the lake,” Mòrag informs him, loud and clear. “Please leave.”

“So sorry!” yells a woman. “But we can’t!”

“Why not!” Mòrag yells back.

“We’ve lost the oars!”

Brighid starts snickering. Mòrag rubs her temples.

“I’m so sorry,” Mòrag then says solemnly to Brighid. “But I’m going to have to row out there myself, so if you do not wish to-”

“Don’t worry darling,” Brighid says, and Mòrag feels both thrilled and gooey inside at the endearment, “I’m coming with you. This is actually almost funny.”

“Glad you think so.” Mòrag says, aiming for dead-pan but overshooting into fond and besotted. Brighid takes her hand, and Mòrag smiles even though her next sentence inevitably is, “We’re going to have to take the rowboat out of the barn.”

* * *

One hour later Brighid is sitting at the nose of the boat, which is likely not called ‘the nose of the boat’ but the only thing Mòrag ever bothered to learn about rowboats was how to row them, and meanwhile Mòrag is trying to push the boat away from the shore. They’ve got a lantern and an extra pair of oars with them in the boat, which took twenty minutes to find, so if the two idiots have somehow managed to leave the lake before then Mòrag _will_ hunt them down for sport.

“Sit tight,” she tells Brighid, then shoves the boat out into the lake and takes a leap into it. The boat sways but Mòrag keeps her balance, sitting down and putting the oars into their sockets.

_Lake vandals, I’m coming for you._

Dawn is already starting to break now, and Mòrag quickly rows their boat out onto the lake, aiming for the lumpy shape floating aimlessly near the center of the lake. As they draw nearer and the sun gets higher, it becomes obvious that it is indeed a rowboat with two people sitting in it, and Mòrag scowls at them. It feels very gratifying to see that Brighid is also frowning at the idiots, when Mòrag takes a quick glance in her direction.

“Hey!” Mòrag calls out.

“Yes!” the guy cries. “Do you have any oars, oh most excellent of saviours?”

“Please,” the girl adds.

“We have oars!” Mòrag says, and starts to grimly row even closer. Brighid is leaning forward in her seat, and Mòrag almost feels the suspense too, as the last of the fog parts for them and their boat bumps into the idiots’ boat. And in the boat sits… two people, as they already knew. The _clothes_ , which they couldn’t see from a distance, are another matter entirely. The man is dressed like a pirate without a hat, and the woman has violently green hair and appears to be - dressed like a mermaid. With pointy ears. And a heart-shaped bra.

Neither of them, Mòrag acknowledges in some absent part of her brain that has already gone numb with horror, is wearing a shirt.

“What,” asks Brighid, who recovers faster than Mòrag from this appallable choice of cosplaying venue, “Were you two doing?”

“Well, Zeke had this brilliant idea-” begins the girl.

“A romantic boat ride in the moonlight!” the guy exclaims. “Just you, me, Turters, and the moon, baby.”

“Yeah,” the woman says. “So that’s how it went down, we got ourselves a boat-”

“-and this lake here, we just walked over here from grandpa’s house, and then-”

“Stop, stop,” Mòrag interrupts. “I’m sorry, there was a third person with you?”

“Turters!” the girl says proudly, bends down as if she’s going to pick something up - sheer terror shoots through Mòrag at the thought of these two bringing _a baby_ out with them in the boat - but then when the girl sits up straight, in her hands she’s carefully cradling a…

“A turtle.” Mòrag closes her eyes. She can physically _feel_ her will to live slowly leaving her body.

“Well, yeah,” the girl says. “Whatcha think it was? A toaster?”

Brighid asks, “So why are you dressed like that?”

“What?” the guy asks, affronted. “These are my normal clothes! I wear ‘em every day.”

There is not a single combination of words in the entire universe, in any language, that could have decimated Mòrag more than those specific two sentences in this moment.

“Yeah,” the woman agrees. “He does. And I’m, you know how it gets really, really hot in Torna in the summer? Yeah so I thought that I’d just save myself some time and wear a bikini top-”

“Do you want the oars?” Mòrag interrupts, only a little desperately.

“Yes, yes! Thank you, thank you good chums, this is very kind of you-”

Mòrag doesn’t even ask for them to return the oars. They can keep them for all she cares, just as long as they never, _never_ show up here again.

* * *

Mòrag and Brighid row back to the estate, put away the boat, and then they decide to just try and go back to sleep. The result is that they wake up around ten, lie in bed for another hour feeling like soggy bread, and finally Brighid extricates herself from Mòrag’s embrace to take a shower, which leaves Mòrag to decide that yes, she will get up and do something today.

Perhaps she will even start out with something ambitious: making brunch.

The rest of the day passes in a lazy haze, and they spend most of it lying down on some sort of surface. When evening comes Hugo returns to the house, rouses them for dinner, and then they play an unsatisfying round of Nopopo Yard and return to bed.

The next day, however, Mòrag wakes bright and early and decides to surprise Brighid with breakfast in bed.

She makes toast, loads a tray with jam and marmalade and coffee, and brings the whole stack back to their chambers, where Brighid is busy taking a shower. The tray is therefore promptly dumped on the bed so that Mòrag can sort the different foodstuffs and jars while she waits. Though when Brighid comes back Mòrag just _has_ to get up from the bed to kiss her, because Brighid looks even more absolutely breathtaking than usual, dressed in one of Mòrag’s shirts and with her wet hair curling gently at the ends.

“Morning,” Brighid says against Mòrag’s mouth, smirking.

It’s a beautiful sunny day. But why should they ever go outside, actually, when they can just stay right here?  
“I’m getting your clothes wet,” Brighid says, sounding more amused than concerned.

“Mmfh,” Mòrag answers. They’ve had small talk like this before. Mòrag never cares about her clothes.

She’s just about to suggest something very rather spicy, when cousin Hugo dutifully appears to knock on the door and ruin the moment.

“What now.” Mòrag asks flatly, and Hugo says brightly,

“The neighbour’s having his annual barbeque party tonight! Thought I’d extend the invitation to the pair of you, since you’re staying here another week.”

“Barbeque?” Brighid asks innocently.

“Oh yes!” Hugo says, the horrible enabler. “All we neighbours gather in his yard and grill food all evening, very homely and fun.”

“We don’t have to go,” Mòrag says, half-heartedly trying to put a stop to this before it evolves into something even worse, like a fishing trip.

“Why not?” Brighid says.

Ten hours later, and Mòrag’s sitting in the backseat of Hugo’s car, Brighid’s head snuggled into her shoulder, as they drive towards that bloody barbeque party. Hugo had lamented over Niall sadly not being here, while Mòrag felt jealous of him, but since Brighid seemed at least a tiny bit curious… Mòrag will be good. Mòrag will _enjoy_ this.

They roll up to the yard the barbeque will be held in, outside a frankly tiny cottage. There’s two other houses in walking distance, and both of them look bigger and newer and more lived-in that this little hut. But nevertheless there’s a few strings of lights thrown up outside and a little crowd clustered in the yard, among them an elderly couple, a trio of young people with a kid, a few teenagers, and…

“No.” Mòrag cannot believe it. She refuses to.

“Oh,” Brighid says in agreement, sounding a bit faint.

Who else if not the lake idiots are standing over by the grill, nursing a plate of sausages and a very pointy stick. The man is wearing an apron with something clearly written on it that _might_ possibly be ‘Mr. Good Lookin’ Is Cookin’, but at this point Mòrag really is only trying her hardest _not_ to look, so who knows.

At least there’s no sign of the turtle.

“Here we are!” Hugo says cheerily, slamming open the driver’s door with much gusto, clearly looking forward to spending his evening with his neighbours. 

Mòrag wonders if it’s too late to declare herself deathly ill.

“Hurry up, come on out and say hello,” Hugo continues brightly, going around the car to open the door for her, and Mòrag thinks, _no_ . No, she will _not_ allow herself to be cowed by the mere _possibility_ that she might have to talk to the lake vandals again! No, for she is Mòrag Ladair, she has fist-fought homophobes, made grown men weep and crushed many business rivals, and one measly eve of socialising with a few people of dubious life choices is _not_ going to be what breaks her. She is ready for this. In fact, she will positively enjoy this - she will _savour_ it.

“Let us feast, Brighid,” she says, and makes sure to open the door before Hugo can, confidently stepping out. Brighid is quick to follow, holding her skirts aside with one hand and slipping the other into Mòrag’s. Mòrag squeezes her hand, and together they follow Hugo into the yard.

They’re immediately intercepted by the elderly couple, who greet Hugo like an old friend. “Addam!” Hugo says happily, “This is my cousin, Mòrag, and her partner, Brighid.”

“Pleased to meet you!” The old man, Addam, says just as cheerfully as Hugo. “I’m Addam and this is my dear wife, welcome to our barbeque!”

“Good evening,” Mòrag tells them as sincerely as she can.

“Hello,” Brighid agrees.

Hugo then starts talking to Addam and his wife about wheat vs rye and the price of pestilence nowadays, so Mòrag and Brighid start to inch away from him. Mòrag does not have a specific goal in mind, so when Brighid then takes charge Mòrag is happy to follow as she approaches the trio and their kid.

“Hello,” Brighid greets them. “I take it you’re neighbours of Addam as well?”

“Oh, hello yourself!” The short lady with the braid says. “Yup, we sure are. I’m Lora.”

“I’m Haze,” the short lady in the dress says shyly. She’s holding hands with Lora. “Hi.”

“And this is Jin,” Lora says, taking the hand of the tall man standing a little behind him, “and Mik,” she finishes, nodding at the kid. The kid glares at Mòrag.

A kindred spirit, Mòrag sees.

“I’m Brighid and this is Mòrag,” Brighid says.

“Ah, did you two move out here?” Lora looks unbelievably excited at this prospect, so much so that Mòrag almost feels bad for confessing,

“No, I’m afraid I’m just Hugo’s cousin here for a visit.”

“Too bad,” Lora says. Then, “Hey, have you tried any of the food yet? C’mon, we gotta get you two something to snack on…”

Lora skips away, and Mòrag feels like there’s no choice but to follow, so they do. Unfortunately, she’s heading for the grill.

“Here, here, look!” Lora says happily, taking a plate of grilled sausages from a table standing right next to the grill, the grill at which the lake vandals are standing around. She starts rummaging through the bottles stacked on the table, innocently showing them off to Mòrag and Brighid while cheerfully narrating this whole experience: “There’s ketchup, mustard, yuck, _mayonnaise_ …”

“Interesting,” Mòrag says, and makes sure to stand so that her back is turned to the lake idiots, and prays.

Brighid, quickly coming to stand next to Mòrag, says, “Ooh, is there any tabasco sauce?”

“Hey, I found a can of whipping cream!” Lora exclaims.

“Oi, do you ladies need more meat?” an unmistakable accented voice asks boisterously from behind them, and Mòrag contemplates face-planting on the grill.

“Yeah, we got chicken,” the other lake vandal says.

“Chicken?” Lora asks, with interest, and then the lake idiots are moving over to them, away from the grill, carrying a plate of burnt chicken remains. 

“Chicken!” the guy booms. 

“Ah,” Brighid says. Mòrag takes a very bracing breath and prepares herself for war.

“Oh, hey,” the green-haired one says, noticing them first. “It’s the people who rescued us from the lake. ‘Sup?”

“Hello again,” Mòrag says grimly.

“Our saviours!” the guy cries. He is, indeed, wearing an apron proclaiming that ‘Mr. Good Lookin’ Is Cookin’, but that’s not the worst part - nor his sparkly flip-flops - it’s the fact that he is, once again, not wearing a shirt.

“How do you do?” Brighid asks, flatly.

“We are doing most excellent, aren’t we, buttercup?” he looks at the green-haired girl with a grin.

“Hell yeah we are, snugglekins,” the girl agrees, and they fist-bump. She turns to them again. “So did ya want any chicken? ‘Cause I’m ten seconds away from devouring it all, I’m just saying.”

“Can I have some?” Lora asks, holding out a plate, and the girl bestows some grilled chicken upon her. Mòrag clings to Brighid’s hand and tries to will the stream of time to move faster.

“I’m Zeke von Genbu,” the guy then says, unprompted. “You two enjoying the party?”

“Well,” Mòrag says. And then she doesn’t say anything more.

“I know, I know,” Zeke von Genbu says soothingly, making an alarming hand gesture with the hand he’s not holding a spatula in. “This party is a little slow, grandpa wanted to start out calmly, you see? But what this evening really needs,” he says, dramatically, finishing with a flourish, “Are some fun-for-everyone _party games_.”

Mòrag has discovered a religion, right here, right now. That religion is called _Suffering_ , and if you pray fervently enough then perhaps you will end up _here_ , right here, in Actual Hell.

“Wow,” Brighid says.

“I know,” Zeke agrees. “Pandoria, sugar plum, sweet pea, it is TIME… to begin the _party games_.”

“Aye, aye my prince,” the girl, presumably _Pandoria_ on her birth certificate and not Sweet Pea, says and salutes. “I’ll round up the others,” she says, and Mòrag would worry more about her choice of words if not for the fact that _then_ Pandoria turns around and walks away, and instead Mòrag is confronted by the fact that Pandoria is wearing a pair of poofy, otherwise elegant in a medieval way, shorts with the words ‘art thou nasty’ written across her behind.

* * *

“The rules of Sardines,” Zeke is proclaiming into a microphone he got from Architect-knows-where, “Are much like the rules of the children's’ game, hide-and-seek, BUT!” he holds up a finger, stopping his pacing abruptly in front of his audience, still wearing that bloody apron, “There is one secret ingredient in it that hide-and-seek does not have! One vital component! One spice to make this game - the perfect game for a barbeque party!” he throws up a hand. “Namely: one person hides, and all others shall seek them! And when you find them, you shall… _hide together with them_! And thus, people shall pile up like sardines.”

He finishes his speech, bowing. In the audience, one of the teenagers is holding up a hand.

“Yes!” Zeke cries, pointing at her. “What is your question, Mythra?”

“How do you win.” 

“You win,” Zeke declares, “By being the first to find the one in hiding! By becoming the first of the sardines!”

“BUT,” Pandoria adds, jumping in and snatching the microphone from her partner-in-crime, “The game CANNOT end before _everyone_ has become a sardine.”

“That’s right!” Zeke cries. “Now let us begin! I shall be the first to hide! Pandoria, start the countdown!”

Mòrag and Brighid look at each other.

“For the win?”

“For the win.” Brighid holds out a hand. “May the best woman win.”

Mòrag takes her hand, brings it up so she can kiss it, and then they shake on it.

-Pandoria makes them all cluster by the porch and close their eyes, counting down from sixty with earth-shattering loudness, while Zeke supposedly goes scuttling off into the foliage like an overgrown rodent. When the time’s up, Pandoria bangs two pots together, and then all twelve or so of them set loose into the wild.

Lora and her family move more slowly, laughing and talking amongst them, checking behind the cars and under the table and other obvious places. Mythra immediately set off like a heat-seeking missile, while the other two teenagers both look very lost and keep blushing a lot when they accidentally touch hands, and their efforts in the game are quite frankly sad. Mòrag won’t judge, though. She and Brighid split up at the start, and Morag starts to make her way away from the yard, out into the silent, murky fields behind Addam’s house.

She’s snooping around by a stream lined with large, hunching trees when she hears something suspicious. Driven by a lust to win rather than any mortal qualms about getting muddy, Mòrag therefore marches unhesitatingly down to the stream, and beneath a small bridge, she finds them.

Zeke, sitting on a stone and looking pleased with himself, and Mythra, sitting straight in the grass and looking at something on her phone. The glow from her screen is attracting insects, and with regular intervals Mythra snaps and waves them away, before going back to staring mindlessly.

“Well, well,” Mòrag says, and settles in to wait.

First to find them is Brighid, which makes Mòrag feel irrationally proud. Brighid and Mòrag then curl up together in the grass, Brighid in Mòrag’s lap because there’s one of them who cares about her clothes getting ruined, and it isn’t Mòrag. Then they wait, together, which makes it all the better, somehow.

Thirty minutes of waiting _is_ a bit excessive though, no matter how nice the weather is and how pleasantly cool the night feels, even if at that point the only ones who _haven’t_ found the gang are the two hapless teenagers.

“Call it quits,” Mythra insists. “I won already.”

“It’s against the spirit of-”

“Buddy,” Mythra says, making it sound like a slur, “Trust me, Pyra and her boyfriend will _never_ find us. Just end it.”

“Fine!” Zeke pulls out his phone, and starts texting someone underneath Mythra’s strict supervision, and thirty seconds later he tells them all that, “This round is over! Everyone, chop chop, back to grandpa’s house!”

* * *

They play another round. Since the prize of winning is the honour to hide in the next round, everyone waits on the porch again while this time Mythra disappears into the wilderness. Then everyone gets up to look again - though Mòrag sees, with disapproval, that several of the guests go slacking off to eat the leftovers from the barbeque instead. Mòrag still resolves to look diligently, however, and proceeds to do a thorough sweep of the whole neighbourhood.

It's been an hour or so when she’s finally had enough and goes trekking back to Addam’s house, where she finds Brighid, sitting in a sunchair and snacking on some unidentifiable charred meat. “Want some?” Brighid offers.

“Yes,” Mòrag admits.

They sit down together and eat a bite. Lora and her family are sitting by the porch together with Hugo, eating sausages, and Addam’s wife appears to be asleep in another sunchair.

“Has anyone found Mythra yet?” Mòrag eventually finds herself asking.

“Nope,” Brighid says. 

“How do you know that?” Mòrag wonders.

“Group-chat,” Brighid says, and pulls out her phone. 

“ _Already_?” 

Brighid shrugs.

Mòrag slouches down on the ground and crosses her arms behind her head, looking up at the sky. In stark contrast to the city, the stars are actually visible at night out here.

Eventually, Addam shows up and wakes his wife. The two teenagers return also, sitting down on the grass to star-gaze together.

It’s five minutes of this before Mòrag actually sits up and asks, “Is nobody looking for her anymore?”

“Cousin Zeke and Pandoria still are,” the teenaged boy says, holding up his phone. 

“It’s been - 95 minutes.” Mòrag stares him down.

“Well,” the boy says with a nervous chuckle. “I think he’s thinking about calling the police, actually. Um.”

“All the neighbours are already here looking for her,” Brighid agrees.

Mòrag heaves a deep, deep sigh.

* * *

Eventually some cops show up to help and look for Mythra, who, according to one of the teenagers, Pyra, who appears to be Mythra’s sister, is refusing to come out of her hiding spot because of spite. At this point it’s well into the night and Mòrag has been bitten by one too many mosquitoes, and she’s thinking wistfully about her bed. Preferably her bed with Brighid in it.

“Well,” Hugo says as he comes over to them. “It’s getting quite late, and I’ll have to get up early tomorrow…”

“ _Yes_ ,” Mòrag says intensely. “It is time to go home, Hugo, you are quite right. Brighid?”

“Yes, darling,” Brighid agrees, and so they get up and dust themselves off. 

The three of them are nearly at the car, the sweet jingling sound of the car keys in Hugo’s hand giving Mòrag a burst of energy, when Zeke appears to intercept them, jumping out from behind one of the police cars.

“Chums!” he exclaims. “Leaving already?”

“Yes, I’m afraid we’re in quite a hurry, Zeke,” Mòrag says swiftly.

“Ah well,” he says wistfully. “Thank you for coming! We _really_ should do this again sometime, eh?”

“Never ever in my life, but thank you Zeke,” Mòrag says, and herds Hugo and Brighid into the car before either of them can get any other ideas.

When they then finally get the car started and drive away, Mòrag can see Zeke and Pandoria both stand together by the road and wave them goodbye as they drive off.

**Author's Note:**

> the shorts :) http://www.ohpapillon.com/2018/08/create-art-thou-nasty-walkthrough.html


End file.
